There is a need to package large quantities of different sized vehicle wheels for transport. The primary means of transportation are shipping containers and as secondary loads in vehicles, such as pick up trucks, humvees, tractor trailers, etc. Therefore the wheels need to be packaged on an apparatus that is moveable and transportable because packaging of the wheels may occur prior to loading containers or trucks. The wheel weights may range from about 50 lbs to about 1000 lbs or more, thus the apparatus needs to be strong enough to support heavy loads. Additionally, there is a need to maximize the available space inside of the shipping container or truck (or other vehicle carrying a secondary load) by volume. A new regulation for Government Agencies who ship wheels is that the wheels should be stored vertically to extend the life of the wheels while in storage. It has been determined that flat packing of wheels on top of each other cause the wheels to deteriorate in storage.
Currently, the commercial practice of packing wheels for shipping in trucks is to have them individually loaded and off loaded by people. This is time intensive, and risks injury to those loading and unloading the wheels. For other transport, wheels are packed flat on wooden pallets and then secured to the pallet for transport. Using pallets often leads to flat stacking of wheels in violation of government regulations.
Thus there is a need for a wheel storage and transport device that overcomes the above listed and other disadvantages.